Flexible welt shoe with staggered lock-stitching



Jan. 12, 1954 s. MOCONNELL 2,665,504

FLEXIBLE WELT SHOE WITH STAGGERED LOCK-STITCHING Filed Sept. 8, 1952 IN V EN TOR.

fwazywul k Mwm WW1 W7? Patented Jan. 12, 1954 assassin FLEXIBLE' WELT .SHOE WITH JSTAGTGERED L'OCK-STITQHINIG .Rnland G. Mcoonmu, Portland, Masha, .assignor :to Sebas'o-Moc .Shoe Gunilla-nu, Westbrook, Mainc aconporation of Maine Appli'cat-ion September 8, 1952, Serial No. 308,319 p i1 (ores-a1.

'iflh is'z invention :comprises :a mew "improyed welt-shoe chairing highly .desirahlezchamacheristics in respect to flexibility, lightness, comfort, durability zand'ease tof mamriadture.

For many years attempts have been made to produce a wvel t shoe-Withoutthe necessity of employing a .ribbed insole and a filler layer of substantial thickness with the resulting stiffening ofithe shoe bottom. j p

an effort to get away "from'ithe objections to the "Goodyear welt shoe as outlined above; a substantial quantity of shoes have "been produced by the Littleway welt process, whereby the upper, innersole and welting are stitched together by a Littleway lock stitch seam. However, Littleway welt shoes made without the structural features of these new and improved shoes have not had a satisfactory life in wear, and particular difficulty has occurred in the breaking away of the stitches in the vicinity of the ball line. This has been due in some measure to a pronounced tendency of the upper and welt to rub or shift relatively to each other when the shoe bottom is severely flexed in that part of the shoe. Attempts have been made to reinforce the bond between the upper and welting with metallic staples, but this expedient has not been satisfactory for obvious reasons. The result has been that the trade for the past many years has been unwilling to accept Littleway welt shoes of the general type subject to the present improvement. A light, flexible welt shoe is re-established as a desirable article of commerce as a result of the present invention.

Going more into detail, my improved welt shoe comprises a thin, fiat, unchanneled and flexible insole to which the lasting margin of the upper is secured in fiat condition by adhesive or otherwise, a welt overlapping the margin of the upper, and two lines of lock-stitches arranged in contiguous parallel relation with adjacent stitches staggered and all stitches passing through the welt, the margin of the upper and the insole, thus providing a double lock-stitch bond between the welt and the upper throughout the length of the welt at least in the ball and forepart portions of the shoe. An outsole is stitched to this welt in the usual manner. This construction eliminates the raised channel seam under the foot, the metal staples often used, and several operations incidental to the production of the conventional Goodyear welt shoe.

Exhaustive wear tests of shoes of the character described have quite unexpectedly demonstrated that breakage of the Littleway seam in.

. :2 mepeated fiexing 0f the shoe bottom has been (entirely eliminated. Several hundred thousand pairiinlon'e afactory have been produced without a ss'i-ng le instance o'f'returns oil-account of breakage. d tiappea rs, moreover, that the two adjacent lines rtiflock-stitching protect and reinforce each-other and that the life :of the shoe before the lockwea'rs off is more than doubled. My improved construction, moreover, permits the employment'of -a very ithin,iiiat Iinsole "with a light layer filler; for example, a thin sheet o'f'sponge' rubber maybe successfully-employed and this imparts a-oushion effect to the insole without in any way stiffening the shoe bottom.

The shoemaking operations involved in the production of my improved welt shoe are easily within the capacity of the personnel available in any manufacturing establishment and, in fact, the double lock-stitch welt sewing operation is one that can be carried out more rapidly and with less skill than is ordinarily required in the conventional welt sewing operation.

These and other features of the invention will be best understood and appreciated from the following description of a preferred embodiment thereof selected for purposes of illustration and shown in the accompanying drawings in which:

. Fig. 1 is a bottom plan view of the lasted and welted upper;

Fig. 2 is a fragmentary view in perspective showing a portion of the complete shoe bottom; and

Fig. 3 is a fragmentary view in perspective illustrating the welt sewing operation.

The illustrated shoe may be of the moccasin type or. of any other desired style. As herein shown, it comprises an insole In which, since it is not to be channeled, need not be more than 2 or 3 irons in thickness and may be cut from any suitable fibrous insole material. The upper H is herein shown ascement lasted, that is to say, its lasting margin I2 is drawn inwardly under tension over the exposed face of the insole I 0 and adhesively secured in flat condition thereto. If desired the lasting margin may be skived, but in any case it is reduced to a thin, flat rim extending continuously from the heel breast line on one side, around the forepart, and back to the heel breast line on the other side. The rear end of the upper, which includes a heel seat pocket I3, is herein shown as having been heel seat lasted.

After the last has been withdrawn, the welt i4 is placed in overlapping position upon the lasting margin l2 and is secured in place by two lines 15 and 16 of lock-stitches arranged in con- 3 tiguous parallel relation with adjacent stitches longitudinally staggered with respect to each other; that is to say, each stitch of the outer line I5 is placed ahead of each stitch oi the inner line by the length of one-half a stitch. The two lines are disposed in contiguous relation, the stitches being in contact with each other at their contiguous sides. All of the stitches pass through the inner edge of the welt H, the lasted margin (2 of the upper, and the outer edge portion of the insole I0. The lock is preferably formed approximately half way between the two surfaces of the welt 14 or above the inner surface of the insole ID as shown in Fig. 3. this figure the needle I! of the lock-stitch machine is shown as operating to form the outer line It of lockstitches.

The welt may be supplied and continuously guided to the stitching point by a welt guide or conventional type, or it may be placed in position and preliminarily attached by cement to the shoe bottom The advantage of sewing the welt in flatcondition is obvious, No welt heat: ing ppeiation is required and the welt lies almost flush with, the exposed faced the insole. These characteristics all contribute tea light flexible shoe while preserving the repairability so highly p izedin w t ce H ,r e e flhe shoe bottom is completed by applying the usual bottom filler l9, laying an outsole 20, and securingthe outsole to thewelt 14 by the usual lock-stitch seam l8, all as shown in Fig. 2.

As shown in the accompanying drawings, the double welt seam is extended into the shank portion of the shoe, and while this is desirable in some instances, the principal advantages of my improved construction are secured by extending the seam throughout the forepart and ball portions of the shoe without necessarily extending the double seam into the shank.

Having thus disclosed my invention and described in detail an illustrative embodiment thereof, I claim as new and desire to secure by Eett'ers Patent:

A welt shoe comprising a thin flexible insole, an upper having its lasting margin secured in flat condition to the outer face of an insole, a welt overlapping the margin of the upper, two lines of lock stitches arranged in contiguous parallel relation with adjacent stitches longitudinally staggered and all stitches passing through the welt, the margin of the upper and the insole, thus providing a double lock-stitch bond between thewelt and upper, and an outsole stitched to the welt. i

ROLAND G. McCONNELL.

lteierences J ited in the file of this patent UNlTED STATES PATENTS Number Name Date 1,554,489 Bird Sept. 2-2, 1925 1,648,932 Blair NOV. 15, 1927 1,773,406 Ramsey Aug. 19, 1930 

